Will PJ Thum present the first and only poll of the election?

Cancel your appointments for the night of 24 April 2025. If you have decided to attend an election rally, you need to reconsider your life priorities. Sure, you can spend 3 hours in a field or stadium experiencing attempts by politicians and their plants in the crowd to whip the crowd into a frenzy. We at Illusio have found a far more important, more exciting, more elusive event in Singapore's political history, one that is literally singular and may never be repeated again.

A political rally, from Wikimedia

This is why you should attend Dr PJ Thum and New Naratif's The Citizen Agenda at 7pm, at The Projector at Golden Mile (yes, it's a free event).

As far as the description goes:

In 2024 we ran The Citizens' Agenda survey... In your opinion, what issues do you consider important to Singapore and think that the candidates in the upcoming General Election should talk about as they compete for your vote? We asked, you answered… And we compiled them into a book... You will find analyses of the data gathered, as well as the articles that we produced to explain and analyse the top issues.

Is this an election survey or opinion poll?

In Singapore, the publication, distribution, and sharing of opinion polls and election surveys during the period of a general election (i.e. from Nomination Day to Polling Day) is illegal. This year, the Elections Department of Singapore has very helpfully provided a PDF guide which includes an explanation on what is and isn't a survey that comes under its ban.

17. "An election survey is an opinion survey of how voters will vote at an election... or any issue with which an identifiable candidate is associated at an election".

Let's leave aside the questions of survey methodology, representativeness of the sample of "voters", and the classic problem of reliability and validity for the time being. We must concede that Dr Thum's Citizen Agenda fulfills the criteria of being a poll; i.e. at the broadest, it is a public opinion poll involving issues and the upcoming election campaigns. We must also concede that the book that will be launched on 25 April will be a publication and analysis of the poll, and that the event itself is a public presentation of the poll, and anyone sharing key findings from that event will be deemed as distributing the poll as well.

So yes, Dr Thum will be engaged in the very near future, of publishing a poll. Never before has a poll been published in Singapore during an election, out of the desire of sane, ordinary people to comply with the law, however oppressive and limiting. Never will this be repeated again, if Dr Thum is made to bear the brunt of the law.

But is it legal? Or illegal?

We at Illusio would like to remind readers and Dr Thum that we are not lawyers, and this does not constitute legal advice. We are merely reading through, very carefully, referencing the official event description to the ELD advisory.

YES, this is an opinion survey for the election, inasfar as New Naratif has polled respondents on issues that they feel candidates should talk about.

NO, this survey does not ask respondents which issues will affect their voting choices, or how their preferred issues will affect their voting choices.

NO, this survey does not ask respondents to identify their preferred candidates or political parties.

On the face of it, we believe that Dr Thum and New Naratif have not broken the law, and their survey does not fall under ELD's specific ban on opinion surveys of how they will vote at an election, or issues that an identifiable candidate (or party) is associated with. Saner outfits in the past have legally conducted post-election surveys in lieu of exit polls, published very recent pre-election surveys just before Nomination Day, amongst other measures to comply with the law.

However, once Dr Thum, his published book, or his guest speakers attempt to correlate what their respondents say is important to various parties, candidates, manifestos, he will fall foul of the law.

Furthermore, when the Q&A begins, can Dr Thum and his guests control themselves when Singaporeans, being Singaporeans in an election period, ask them to correlate their findings to specific parties and candidates?

Will the excruciating length of 3 hour event give Dr Thum enough time to loosen his tongue, lose his inhibitions, and noose to hang himself?

Fourth time lucky?

Let's assume that Dr Thum jumps through all the hoops and avoids all the death traps.

Sure, an election survey poll, taken 1 year ago, that has nothing to do with the actual election is of very limited utility and relevance. Nonetheless, Dr Thum would have greatly expanded, for the general public, publications, and pollsters in Singapore, the space of legal possibilities on what can and cannot be said, published, and shared during an election. And perhaps it may inspire other more credible, relevant, and informative polls in the future. We at Illusio are rooting for Dr Thum's compete success.